Q&A with Henk Francino of The RSF
Before Mamnick I was dealing in vintage clothing, my weekends were spent riding the bike and traveling the UK to bicycle jumble sales, looking for deals. Before the big boom in the vintage market and old school bikes becoming cool, you could pick-up all sorts of top-end bike parts from the 50s-90s for next to nothing. I rarely bought bike parts to sell-on, I was building a collection of bits for my own bikes, for when current parts wore-out and needed replacing. I have many parts still sitting in my cellar, ready for when they need using.
During this time I came across an issue of the Rough Stuff Fellowship Journal. It was sold to me for 50p at a jumble sale in Coal Aston. Although these book didn’t instantly resonate with me, partly due to the bikes that were being ridden in the modern journals (mountain bikes by this time) and the pace of which they appearing to be rode (it looked painfully slow!) but I went away and did a bit of digging on the internet and found more interesting images on blogs and photo feeds.
I was doing a bit of ‘rough-stuff’ on the road bike (somewhat reluctantly at first) and it was great to get away from the traffic. Friends from a local Sheffield club introduced me to the network of back-wack and lesser known roads and bridleways of the Peak District too. It felt exciting and explorative.
At the same time, images by people such as David Pountney (view here) and the late Tim Hughes of the CTC influenced the way I saw the bike and rides I was keen to do. All this rolled together became a large part of Mamnick.
That is something I've always obsessed about, for right or wrong - Horizontal top-tubes, frame-pumps, steel, saddle-bags, bobble hats, mudguards and mudflaps! A lot of my friends, including myself, still ride bikes of that appearance, especially through winter. It all seems to make sense. It all just seems to look right too.
Mamnick has always become a vehicle to explore the things I love on and off the bike, so to publish this interview with the current secretary of the RSF club, 9 years after buying that RSF journal, gives me great pleasure.
It's nice when things come full-circle like that.
How did you come to be involved with The RSF?
When walking in the heart of the Cairngorms in the 1970s I met a guy with his bike over the shoulders and asked him what he was after. He handed me a leaflet about the Rough Stuff Fellowship and I joined there and then. And never regretted. I’d always been cycling ever since I was very young, over the years I discovered there’s more than busy roads. Apart from cycle touring and bike packing I witnessed the beginnings of mountain biking by the end of the 1970s/start 1980s and more or less got addicted to MTB as well.
Which are your favourite stretches of road to ride on locally and what is it that you like about them?
I am now based in the east of the Netherlands, I have my daily rides around town (Deventer). There is a lot of rides to choose from but my favourite stretches are a mix of mtb trails and paths along the river IJssel. But I do longer rides too and in the National Park De Sallandse Heuvelrug, a hilly part - formed at the end of the last ice age. It’s the mix of terrain and landscape that attracts me most.
The same question for roads anywhere in the world?
Apart from Wales and Scotland, the Alps and Dolomites are favourites of mine. Down hill MTB-ing I like most, but I also enjoy the steep climbs which are often also involved.
What is your most memorable moment on the bike or involved with cycling?
That’s the Salto Mortale I made last year, a couple of miles from home. Memorable in the sense that I’m still alive and kicking but I had some awkward injuries with my right hand (which is now healed).
Do you have any cycling pet hates?
Not really, perhaps the long waiting times at certain traffic lights here in town!
Would you say that when the MTB was introduced, you turned your back on the road bike?
No, I didn’t, road cycling and mtb-ing form a good mix for me.
I have noticed the older images from the history of the RSF is all about the road bike, but the current members tend to lean more towards the mountain-bike. Is this a natural evolution or do you think there is more to it?
From what other members tell me I think it’s just a matter of convenience: MTBs are on the whole much stronger and more comfortable (suspension) compared with the good old road bike.
What is your favorite piece of cycling kit (either something you currently own or have in the past)?
My SEVENiDP crash helmet and a Swiss jersey.
What do you like to talk about when you are on a ride with friends/team/club mates? Do you prefer to keep the subjects lightweight or get your teeth into something contentious or controversial?
All sorts of subjects can come along, from the most ordinary (e.g. about shoe strings!) to deeply philosophical, often triggered by the landscape or social settings.
Did you get the chance to ride with or meet with any of the original RSF member like Albert Winstanley or Dick Phillips?
I once rode with Dick Philips during an RSF Easter Meet and Bernard Heath (visiting him in Scotland).
You have a book on the horizon featuring some images from your achieve. Tell me, how did that come about?
After finally having found an archivist for the RSF heritage, he started sorting out the enormous amount of photographs and slides taken over the years (since 1955) by RSF members. Then he wondered if it was possible to share these images with a wider public and in stepped Max Leonard of Isola Press. Max and I had been busy before with the re-publication of Fred Wright’s book Rough Stuff Cycling in the Alps, originally published in 2002 by Ibex Press. The re-print of this book has proved to be a great success and Max suggested he was prepared to take on a new project, the publication of The Rough-Stuff Fellowship Archives, Adventures with the world’s oldest off-road cycling club. And thus it came about that Isola Press and the RSF are going to present this treasure trove of incredible value and beauty in a book, for the first time.
To see The Rough-Stuff Fellowship website click - here
To view the Mamnick hat we have dedicated to the Rough-Stuff Fellowship click ~ here
Images provided by Henk Francino
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